THIS INVENTION relates to an apparatus for manufacturing slats and in particular but not limited to an apparatus for manufacturing venetian blinds automatically.
Prior apparatuses for manufacturing slats for venetian blinds involve two discrete stages. One stage is for cutting slats to length and then the cut slates are manually positioned in the other stage for punching slots in each said cut slats and laddering the punched slats.
Both stages of the prior art require proper setting for slats of particular blinds. In general the cutting stage requires setting a cutter to a position for cutting the slats to a desired length and the punching operation requires fixing punches for punching desired slot shape and setting the punches for punching in desired positions in the slats. As up to five punches may be involved in the punching operation the time for setting are relatively long.
The existing apparatuses are not flexible as they can only be used to manufacture slats selected from two different widths.
As two stages are involved, storage of cut or punched slats is required depending on whether the cutting or punching operation is carried out first.
These apparatuses cannot be fully automated as the cutting stage requires manual positioning of strip materials for cutting.
The existing apparatuses are therefore highly labour intensive and the slats are costly to manufacture. For timber slats, the existing apparatuses do not give a clean cut and chippings occur at ends of the cut slats.
An object of the present invention is to alleviate or to reduce to a certain degree one or more of the prior art disadvantages.
In one aspect therefor the present invention resides in an apparatus for manufacturing slats. The apparatus comprises a strip material feeding station and a cutting station positioned downstream of the feeding station. The feeding station is adapted to feed a strip material into the cutting station for cutting into one or more slats of a preset length, and includes means for ejecting the strip material when the length of the strip material or remnant of the cut strip material is shorter than said preset length.
The ejection means may be arranged to eject the strip material or the remnant at the feeding station or downstream thereof.
Preferably the feeding station includes a receiving section for receiving the strip material to be cut and controllable drive means arranged for feeding the strip material into the cutting station. More preferably the drive means is positioned adjacent to the cutting station.
Desirably the drive means is reversible and the strip material for ejection or the remnant is driven back to the receiving section for ejection.
Preferably the apparatus has a collection section for collecting any of the ejected strip material and the remnants.
The feeding station may also include a magazine section in which a plurality of strip materials are stored and an inserting means for inserting one of the strip materials in the magazine section.
The magazine section desirably includes a guide arrangement for guiding the strip materials in said magazine section. Advantageously the guide arrangement is adjustable for different width of the strip material.
The ejection means may include a sensing device arrange to produce an ejection signal when the strip material or remnant is shorter than the preset length. Typically said sensing means is an optical detector arranged so that it receives an optical signal when the strip material or the remnant is shorter than said preset length.
Preferably the cutting stations include a cutting device positioned in close proximity to the feeding station and in particular to the drive means. This positioning allows a maximum number of slats to be cut from the strip material and remnant size is reduced to a minium.
In preference a vibration damping arrangement is provided for reducing chippings when cutting.
Desirably the cutting device has a saw blade and an anvil for the blade, and the damping arrangement includes employing a vibration damping material for certain parts close to the saw blade and contactable with the strip material during cutting. Said parts typically include a support for supporting the strip material, a clamp for clamping the strip material and the anvil.
The apparatus may have a punching station arranged downstream of the cutting station. The punching station includes a punch head having at least one punch controllably movable for punching apertures in the strip material.
The punch head preferably having a plurality of different punches selectable for a punching operation.
Typically the punch head has an elongate punch fixing member to which the punches are spacedly fixed and the fixing member is movable to select one of the punches for the punching operation.
The punching station is advantageously provided with a punch selection arrangement having a movable selection member with markings indicating positions for the punches and the selection member is connected to the punch head so that a punch can be selected by simply moving the selection member to the corresponding marking.
The apparatus may have a shaping station positioned between the cutting station and the punching station. The shaping station includes a shaping device arranged for shaping cut ends of the strip material.
The shaping device can be arranged to shape adjacent ends of two separate slats simultaneously or in sequence.
The shaping device may be selectable from devices for different shapes.
The shaping device can be arranged to follow a contoured path to product shapes including radiused corners to said ends, and/or bevelled edges.
The apparatus may include one or more laddering stations positioned for receiving the cut and punched slats.
Each said laddering stations may have relatively adjustable side members for selectively setting slat width.
The laddering stations may also have a mechanism for alternating the amplitude of movement of a string oscillating device as the width setting is change. The string oscillating device provides a zig-zag shaped ladder for the slats. The mechanism may comprise a tapered element acting as a stop for either direction of movement to limit the travel according to that required for each width.
The apparatus may have a controller for controlling operations of any of the stations.
The controller may be set for controlling the drive means to feed the strip material a preset length from a plurality of settable lengths. It may also be set to control the slot positions.
The controller settings may be preprogrammed and can then be selected to simply selecting the program for the settings. The programs are preferably bar coded and a bar code reader is used to select the desired program.
The controller may also be set to produce a fixed member of slats.
The controller may also be set to control one or more of the operations.
The strip material may be wood, plastic, metal including aluminium.
Strip materials with widths from 10 to 100 mm can be accommodated by the apparatus.
In order that the present invention can be more readily understood and be put into practical effect the description will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings which illustrate non-limiting embodiments of the present invention, and wherein: